Ann Hornaday, chief film critic for The Washington Post and a longtime regular on the News Hour, has died. Senior arts correspondent Jeffrey Brown looks back on a critic whose passion for cinema shaped how she shared films with viewers.
— via PBS NewsHour, Jeff Brown
Factory workers in India strap on GoPros to film their own routines, raw footage meant to teach robots how to do their jobs. Whether that data can actually produce a working machine is still an open question.
— via NPR, Diaa Hadid
Two teenage prodigies, a continent and a century apart, both end up wrestling with the same question: whether genius is worth the ruin it leaves behind. The novel marks a sharp turn from the memoir that won her a Pulitzer for writing about losing both her sons.
— via NPR, Terry Gross
A teenage girl pedaled her injured father 65 miles on a hot pink bicycle, and the world took notice. Officials and strangers promised cash, coaching, even a film. Here's what actually showed up.
— via NPR, Kamala Thiagarajan
The arts center just handed its programming reins to an agent whose client list includes ZZ Top and Motley Crue's Tommy Lee. The executive director made the call, betting rock-world connections can shape what hits the stage next.
— via NPR, Anastasia Tsioulcas
Eva Marie Saint, who won an Oscar for her first film and turned down a string of studio contracts afterward, has died at 102. She announced her pregnancy mid-acceptance speech in 1955 and went on to outlast most of her era, working into her 90s.
— via PBS NewsHour, Bob Thomas, Associated Press
Edwidge Danticat picks up her fourth National Book Award nod, going head-to-head with first-timer Morgan Thomas in fiction. The nonfiction side ranges just as wide, from the prison system's ties to music to what it means to parent while queer.
— via NPR, Andrew Limbong
The Supreme Court's new term opens Monday with major cases on religion, guns and climate change already lined up. The emergency docket, meanwhile, shows no sign of slowing down.
— via NPR, Nina Totenberg
Texas's education commissioner kept pushing Alpha School's AI program into public classrooms even after the state board rejected the company's charter bid 10 to 3. Emails show he personally connected Alpha with Houston's superintendent and at least nine other districts, three of which launched pilots, while his agency denies any formal partnership.
— via ProPublica, Lexi Churchill
Only 9% of Americans qualify as "Mobilizers," highly active across politics, civics, news and religion, and that share barely budges between cities, suburbs and rural areas. Suburbanites lean toward volunteering over politics, while urban residents are more likely to just watch the news from the sidelines.
— via Pew Research, Beshay Sakla
Sulfur prices are climbing enough to worry farmers, oil supplies are tightening, and somehow Lego bricks have become a yardstick for measuring blockbuster movies. Three unrelated pressure points, one uneasy week in commodities and culture.
— via NPR, Cooper Katz McKim
